Ten years ago, I embraced the nomadic life. I live in four or five cities each year and travel to between thirteen and fifteen to paint murals or exhibit my work. I feel deeply grateful, because over the past decade I have painted 125 murals in 90 different cities and had the opportunity to discover several countries. This way of life allowed me to travel and learn an immense amount, although it also limited my time for study.
Sometimes I wonder how much time I have spent on train platforms and in airports, how many hours in transit that, added together, would amount to days. In those moments, reading has always been a faithful companion. I love studying, and I have read dozens of articles during countless hours of waiting.
I became accustomed to being a stranger, always arriving, always leaving. The emotional landscape you develop under these circumstances is deeply contradictory: immense solitude paired with an indescribable sense of freedom. Having nowhere to return to shapes your character.
I managed to sustain my painting practice between journeys, improvising studios wherever I happened to be. Even so, it was never enough. Emotions are profoundly inspiring, and not transforming them into paintings felt like an enormous waste. I say this because, in a world that is becoming increasingly polarized and inward-looking, being nomadic remains something of a taboo. When you tell people that you live on the road, that you own very few material possessions, and that you embrace impermanence, a certain distance inevitably arises.
Through these experiences, I found a way to create while in constant motion, and, as so often happens, serendipity came to my rescue. Without extensive knowledge of Photoshop or the proper equipment, I began experimenting with the technological tools available to me, developing what I call digital painting. I use that term because, although technology is part of the process, the final result retains a deeply painterly quality.
Metaphysicians is the culmination of these technological explorations: eleven graphic series comprising a total of 500 works. I believe they are highly symbolic and faithfully express everything I have described. The title Metaphysicians refers to the fact that, throughout my travels, I regularly underwent altered states of consciousness in different natural environments. The synthesis of what I learned through ordinary daily life and through the astral realm explored in my experiences with entheogens is reflected throughout this extensive body of work.
It has been a fascinating experience. My intention is not to create with technology, because I love working with my hands. I cherish brushes and rollers, the physical act of painting without screens. I believe Metaphysicians mirrors my sonic experiments in a profound way; both bodies of work trace inner and outer landscapes through which I wandered in search of a door, perhaps one that never existed, to utopia and to light.
My nomadic life is about to come to an end, or perhaps not. I still do not know where. What I do know is that the road has been my greatest teacher, and the time has come to experience something new: perhaps belonging. I still do not know what lies ahead. What remains is this series of images, an abstract travel album.